Chapter 5 - THE MAN BESIDE HIM
Every eye in the diner turned toward Leo.
He didn’t move.
Gabriel did.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
“Give me your gun.”
Leo stared at him.
“Boss—”
“Now.”
Leo removed his weapon and placed it on the counter.
Then a second gun from his ankle.
Gabriel’s expression turned colder.
“Phone.”
Leo surrendered that too.
I watched the oldest relationship in the room collapse in silence.
Leo had been beside Gabriel for eighteen years.
According to Benny, he had carried Gabriel out of a nightclub during an ambush. He had taken a bullet for him. He had slept outside Gabriel’s hospital room.
Now Gabriel looked at him like a stranger.
“What does Elias know?”
Leo shook his head.
“I’ve never spoken to Elias.”
Gabriel held up the phone.
“He said to ask you.”
“Then he wants you suspicious.”
“Congratulations. It worked.”
Leo’s face tightened.
“There is something I didn’t tell you.”
Gabriel’s laugh held no humor.
“Of course there is.”
“Paulie called me the night before he died.”
“What did he say?”
“That someone had been altering food deliveries into your properties.”
Gabriel froze.
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“He had no proof.”
“He died the next day.”
“I know.”
“Why hide it?”
“Because he also told me the person behind it had access through your mother’s family.”
Gabriel stared at him.
“My mother was dead.”
“That’s what we believed.”
Leo reached toward his coat.
Two men immediately aimed at him.
“Easy.”
He slowly removed an old folded document.
“I’ve carried this since Paulie died.”
Gabriel opened it.
A shipping manifest.
Several food suppliers servicing Gabriel’s penthouse, clubs, warehouses, and private events were controlled by shell companies.
All linked to one holding corporation:
EH GLOBAL.
Gabriel looked at Leo.
“Elias Hayes.”
“That’s what I thought.”
My stomach tightened.
“But Elias just said he didn’t poison Paulie.”
Gabriel’s eyes hardened.
“Murderers lie.”
I examined the manifest.
Something bothered me.
“Wait.”
Gabriel looked at me.
“What?”
“This company address.”
EH Global was registered at 174 Mercer Avenue.
I knew that address.
Everybody in the neighborhood did.
“That building isn’t offices.”
“What is it?”
“A charity clinic.”
Leo looked confused.
Gabriel didn’t.
“What clinic?”
“Saint Rosa Community Health.”
The name silenced him.
We drove there before sunrise.
The building was small but immaculate.
A nurse unlocked the door after Gabriel gave his name.
She went pale.
“He said you might come.”
“Who?”
She handed Gabriel an envelope.
Inside was another photograph.
Rosa.
Older.
Very much alive.
Standing in front of the clinic only six months earlier.
Beside her stood the man from the storage-locker photograph.
Elias.
Gabriel stared at his mother.
“She’s alive.”
The nurse nodded.
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
Her eyes filled with fear.
“She disappeared eleven days ago.”
Gabriel looked at me.
Paulie had been poisoned fourteen days ago.
Then the nurse whispered:
“Before she vanished, Rosa told me if Gabriel ever came here, I had to tell him one thing.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
May you like
“What?”
“She said the person trying to kill you lives inside your house.”
